At 04:57 PM 4/20/98 -0700, ghamburg wrote:
>WOW! I got my DMV bill today for my 84 Westy and it was for $175.00 ! my
>1980 Toyota w/ commercial plates was only 61.00
>why the big difference?
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That is rather steep.  My 84 Westy only cost $40.00 to re-register this
year.  Look at your registration/owner's certificate (formerly called a
"Pink Slip" in California) to see how it is designated in the Body Type
Model.  It should say MH (for Motorhome).

Up until 1996 in California, the designation HSCR (Housecar) was used in
previous registrations for Westfalias (mine included).  DMV in their
infinite wisdom (ha!) decided to change all of the designations to
determine factory and aftermarket camper/motorhome conversions.  I had to
convince the DMV that my Westy was indeed a Factory Camper/Motorhome
Conversion by explaining the the VIN number characters that show it.  In
fact when I went to DMV, I took a copy of Vanagon Archive's VIN explanation
post (printed from the archives) with the vehicle to show that it was
factory, not aftermarket, sold at VW dealerships new.

Here's the code to point out to the DMV folks:

The fourth character (or digit) of the VIN explains the Vehicles Series.
The character is supposed to be Z for all Factory Campers (Westfalia) sold
by VW.  Most other Vanagons we see are designated X (Kombi) or Y (Bus)

If you would like a copy of the VIN explanation to carry to the DMV, I'll
be happy to forward a copy to you, because trying to find it in the
archives the way they're configured now is a chore (I downloaded a copy as
a text file last time I looked at it about a year ago)(I spent 20 minutes
today tring to find it in the archives and gave up - I miss that one page
we use to have on the old Lenti server that showed How-To's, Bosch
Ignition, VINS, Adventures, etc., it made finding things so much easier -
Ron are we ever going to see that again?).

Jim Thompson
84 Westy 2.1 * 62 Beetle * 90 Fox Wagon
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